I had picked her up from school and was indulging her request to buy fake nails for our sleepover. She gripped my hand tightly, as a daughter would. We proudly walked through the automatic sliding doors, as one.
I don’t have children of my own, which means my niece is the beneficiary of my pent-up maternal love and obsession. She was born in 2020, and four months later, I left my job as the executive producer of a morning news show in New York and moved to Los Angeles. It was the first time I’d disrupted my ambitious climb up the media ladder, and when my feet landed in the California sand, my role as an aunt became the foundation of my daily life.
Birthdays, ballet recitals, and school performances anchored my calendar. Playing hide-and-seek before dinner, getting ice cream on a Tuesday, and letting her empty my closet for dress-up replaced late-night calls, breaking news, and media dinners. Recently, when my sister traveled abroad for work, my niece wanted assurance that her “substitute mother” would be around.
The phrase made me laugh, but also squeezed my heart like a vise. Because I know what it’s like to have a substitute mother. Daphne Pouletsos worked for the insurance company AON, her office was located in the south tower of the World Trade Center, and she was among the 2,977 victims killed in the 9/11 attacks.
Saza, as we called her, was my mother’s younger sister. Her nickname was a name given by my oldest cousin, Dayna, whose toddler tongue couldn’t say “Aunt Daphne.” Although Saza lived in New Jersey and I grew up in Virginia, she was a constant light in my life. We drove up north for summers and holidays, and Saza would visit us throughout the year.
Once, she hid in the back of our Chrysler minivan when my mom picked my siblings and me up from school, and she revealed herself by suddenly piping into the conversation. We squealed with excitement. Saza knew how to make a mundane moment sparkle.
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